Whether Garfield would have been able to consolidate his somewhat shattered party by effective leadership is a matter of speculation, for, on July 2, 1881, about four months after his inauguration, he was shot by Charles J. Guiteau, a disappointed and half-crazed office seeker, and he died on September 19. His successor, Vice President Arthur, though a man of considerable ability, who managed his office with more acumen and common honesty than his opponents attributed to him, was unable to clear away the accumulating dissatisfaction within his party or convince the country that the party would do its own reforming.
In fact, Arthur, notwithstanding the taint of "spoils" associated with his career, proved to be by no means the easy-going politician that had been expected. He took a firm stand against extravagant appropriations as a means of getting rid of the Treasury surplus, and in 1882 he vetoed a river and harbor appropriation bill which was specially designed to distribute funds among localities on the basis of favoritism. In the same year, he vetoed a Chinese exclusion act as violating the treaty with China, and made recommendations as to changes which were accepted by Congress. Arthur also advocated legislation against the spoils system, and on January 16, 1883, signed the Civil Service law.[24] He recommended a revision of the tariff, including some striking reductions in schedules, but the tariff act of 1883 was even less satisfactory to the public than such measures usually are. Judging by past standards, however, Arthur had a claim upon his party for the nomination in 1884.
But Arthur was not a magnetic leader, and the election of Grover Cleveland as governor of New York in 1882 and Democratic victories elsewhere warned the Republicans that their tenure of power was not indefinite. Circumspection, however, was difficult. A "reform" faction had grown up within the party, protesting against the gross practices of old leaders like Conkling and urging at least more outward signs of propriety. In this faction were Senator Hoar of Massachusetts, George William Curtis, Henry Cabot Lodge, and Theodore Roosevelt--the last of whom had just begun his political career with his election to the New York legislature in 1881. Senator Edmunds, of Vermont, was the leader of this group, and his nomination was warmly urged in the Republican convention at Chicago in 1884.